We met our playgroup friends for Storytime at Pottery Barn Kids on Tuesday morning.  It was a special Eric Carle themed time and Luna loved watching the Hungry Caterpillar book and the fireflies.  She also loved roaming around and watching all of the other kids.  Afterwards, she found the cutest little Dyson vacuum and loved pushing it around.

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This past Thursday, Todd's dad, Abuelo Richard, came through town on his way to Ok City for Luna's cousin Carolyn's 10th birthday party.  He had not seen her walking yet, so he was really entertained. He was also shocked to see she was understanding so much and bringing him books, signing 'more more' to read to her.

On Saturday we headed up to Valley View and Tioga, TX to see my Aunt Amy and Grandmother, who was turning 83.  Luna enjoyed playing with her cousin Devin's old toys he brought out for her and seeing her family!  Our grandmother is doing well, on oxygen now and has Alzheimer's with a full time nurse.  She had a hard time remembering who I was but thought Luna was a cutie pie.

We then stopped by Clark's BBQ on the way home for take out. Todd swears it is the best Brisket Sandwich he's ever had.  I am not a meat eater so I will take his word for it!  It must be good because people fly in on private jets and helicopters for it (Presidents, Governors, and recently the reality show, Most Eligible Dallas came up to eat here too).  We grew up driving out to Lake Kiowa as a child and this was always a pit stop for us.  They now ship some of their food too in case you are interested in ordering some :)

Luna, Todd and I headed up to Northpark Mall on Tuesday to buy Luna her first pair of real shoes!  We went a month ago to Nordstroms because everyone told us it was the place to go, but apparently her foot was too small for a real walking shoe, so they told us to come back in a month.  And our pediatrician recommended Nordstroms too.  So off we went this week to try again, and luckily she is now a size 4 and able to wear real shoes.  When we walked into the department, we told them what we needed and the sales woman shouted, "we have a first walker everyone!" And she ran to go and get her supplies. 
While we were waiting for her, Luna spotted some balloons and just had to have one!  Or all of them for that matter, because she kept following another little boy wanting his balloon too, signing 'more more!'
So, the clerk came back with some boxes of shoes and Luna tried on a few Stride Rites and found a cute pink pair of closed toe sandals.  She also talked us into some boots for fall since they only had 1 more pair in the next size up.
She took Luna's picture, added her to the 'Wall of Walkers' and gave her a cute stuffed animal.  It was a very exciting day for her!  Of course she was not smiling for the camera as usual, she was dreaming of more balloons I'm sure.

The picture below is a picture I took of a picture that they took for us and put it in a cute little card to take home :)  So precious!

I've put together a couple of funny video clips of Luna this past week and saved the cutest funny picture for last.

This first video is my only good one of her obsession with reading books. Like I've said before, it's been impossible for me to capture her going to her book basket and picking one out and then bringing it to me as each time I get out the camera she freezes or wants the camera for herself.  What she normally does is she will bring a book to you and sit in your lap and ask you to read it to her by signing 'more'.  Then will get up and go get another one. Cutest thing ever!

This next clip is of Luna trying to chase down Chica to give her a kiss!  She ran around the room with her lips puckered, ready to give her a kiss. This is all new for her and I swear I didn't ask her to do this- it was all her doing!

Ok, this picture was taken at Baby Bliss on Saturday.  And let me set it up.  I was going shopping to find her a new backpack for her Mother's Day Out (which I am still having second thoughts about- I am not quite ready to have my little girl start school because it was only over 15 months ago that she was still in my stomach!!) 
So I was flipping through the back packs on the floor and then a song comes on the overhead- that new Foster The People,"Pumped Up Kicks" one. Next thing I know, I look over and Luna is holding the hands of this cloth child mannequin and is DANCING WITH IT!! It was the cutest thing I had ever seen and I even called the sales clerk over to see what she was doing!  I wish I had shot it in video mode.  The clerk told me she had never seen another toddler notice the mannequin and show affection towards it!  That's my Luna :)  I thank Kindermusik for teaching us to dance and sing with her and we are always practicing the same things at home all the time.

Todd and I decided to go to one Restaurant Week dinner this year. We usually like to do a couple since it's such a great deal for 35$ for a 3 course meal and for a good cause.  But being a SAHM, we had to just choose one, so the French Room was it!  It is rated one of the best French restaurants in the country and the highest star rating in Dallas.  There is even a dress code.  The service is unbelievable with the waiters in dress coats who have been working there for years.  I first went to the French Room when my mom took me there for my 21st birthday.  Definitely a special occasion restaurant!

When we got there the Maitre'D greeted us and took us to our table, with a REAL candle on it.  I ordered the salad since I was still scared to try anything rich having just gotten over the stomach flu.  Todd got the lobster crab cake and it was the best crab cake ever!  It wasn't fried and was sitting in a lobster bisque. Yum.  Then I ordered the snapper with potatoes and Todd ordered the striped Bass.  For dessert, my favorite part, I ordered the chocolate peanut decadence with a side of homemade ice cream.  Todd ordered their famous Grand Marnier Souffle.  We had a great dinner and I was sad it was over! I can't wait until next year.

And thanks to my mom for babysitting and spending the night to help us out with Luna!!

Tuesday, Todd, Luna and I headed to Northpark to escape the heat and have a fun outing.  We went to her favorite place, the duck pond!  She also picked up a balloon on the way. She has this obsession with them. Does not let them go and will have a huge meltdown if you take one away from her!

Luna turned 15 months on the 13th (Saturday) and had her Well-Check visit yesterday.  Still can not believe the little one is a toddler now and growing up so fast.

Here are some of her stats from the doc visit:
Height: 30 inches (30-40%)
Weight: 19 pounds (5-10%)
Head: 46cm (40%)
Her check up went really well! She is not concerned about her low weight and said babies at this age taper off since she is now more active and walking- some even lose weight!  Her iron was a little low so we have to add more to her diet.  She said not to take our eyes off of her for a second at this age- you're telling me!  She also said they are now offering needle free shots!  They are an extra 10$ each but will be worth it when we go for shots next month. No more tears hopefully.

As for what little Luna is up to now, here are some of her updates:
Food: Eating better now, is back to liking Peas! yay!  She is eating Mango again too, so I am hoping her good old eating habits she had at 7 months are slowly coming back.  She still loves avocado, turkey, cheese, yogurt, veggie dumplings (frozen from Central Market she loves them!) and blueberries and strawberries. And she loves her Annies Wheat Bunnies for snacks.  She is also still breastfeeding 3 times a day and glad because she is hating cows milk still.  I am trying to mix in Almond milk since it's thinner like breastmilk with 2% cow milk.  She takes one sip and she is done.  The Dr. said it's normal for breastfed babies to not like regular milk as much so it's not a big deal.

Motor: Walking faster each day and soon will be running down the halls!  She is also climbing onto low chairs, the fireplace, stairs and anything she can reach.  Luckily we don't have too much for her to climb on.  She also wants 'up' more and clings to my legs to be picked up.

Verbal: Still saying 'up', 'uh-oh', 'light', 'bye-bye', 'mama', 'dada' and we think 'ba' is for balloon- her obsession!  She also still signs really well for milk, more, bye, bath, eat, thank you, duck and light.  She also loves doing the movements to head, shoulders, knees and toes!

Social: LOVES books still.  And loves to sing songs, dances by twirling in a circle and signs for 'more' constantly for more songs and music.  We are so glad she will be in Kindermusik soon

Sleep: Going to bed from 7pm-7am and is NOW taking 1 nap a day :( I miss the morning breaks but so glad we can now run an errand in the morning without rushing home- plus it's good we can get out in the cooler temps in the morning and stay in for the afternoon 100 degree temps!  She is taking a nap from 12-3pm but we first had to start them at 11am since she was not lasting long in the mornings.  I tried for 2 weeks to get her to keep up with her 2 naps a day but for those whole 2 weeks she refused to fall asleep for the afternoon. I would put her in her crib and she would sit and play for a full hour until it was getting close to 4pm, still wide awake and I realized there was no way she was going to take a nap.  She's been doing really well with 1 a day but you never know- some of her 18 month old friends at times need that morning nap here and there so she may one day decide to take 2 when she hits those growth spurts.

Cute things:
-Now when she finds trash or dirt on the floor (leaves we track in) she goes and throws it in the trash can, so cute
-She loves her musical drum and will touch the sound button over and over to hear it and twirl around the room
-She feeds our dogs out of her little snack cup and giggles as she hands them a cracker
-When we sing the 'toys away' song, she starts handing them to us one by one.
-Loves it when we sign 'thank you' and will hand us stuff so we will keep doing it
-Helps me unload the dishwasher by handing me things out of it (plastic stuff of course:)
-Points at lots of things for us to tell her what it is
-Loves swiping our iphones to look at the pictures and her apps and also pretends to talk on the phone with them

Luna had her last art class today :( We have both loved going every week. It has been so cute to see her learn about all the different art elements such as water colors, clay, finger paint, and painters such as Monet, Michelangelo and Picasso. This week the theme was Seurat (remember the painting in Ferris Bueller where Cameron stares at it forever at the art museum?). Since he used pointillism, Luna used the paint bottles with sponge applicators to mimic his style. Basically she was putting little paint dots all over her painting. So adorable!

Monday Luna and I had a little experiment.  Well, I guess I was the one really doing the experiment.  Luna has been fighting her afternoon naps this past week. This means she is put down in her crib for the afternoon, but she has been singing songs to herself, rolling around, and talking to herself in her crib. I even caught her sitting up in her crib and signing 'more' on the video monitor.  Who knows who she thought she was talking to!  So after a week of this, and letting her try to fall asleep on her own for over an hour in the crib, I would give in and get her up and try to keep her up until bed time.  Her morning naps have been from 9-11am so for her to be awake from 11am-7pm is a LONG stretch.  Needless to say she was going to bed around 6:15pm.

So on Monday I decided I would try to keep her up until at least 11am to see if she would move into her afternoon nap.  So off we went to Central Market where she got her very first balloon there. I have been avoiding them because she gets obsessed with them, but it was such a help to have while we shopped because it kept her entertained the entire time!  When we got home, she held onto it and walked all over the house with it!

So I tried to keep her up after we got home at 10am. But by 10:30am she was crying, rolling around on the floor and rubbing her eyes. I took her back to her crib, nursed her and she was out! Didn't wake up until 1:15pm.  So it was a nice nap, but still, we really need to move that nap up a little because the afternoons are too long for her. 
After lunch, we headed to my friend Cheryl's house. I had not been to visit her since her little boy was 6 months old. He's now turning 2 this week!!  They had a great time playing and little Zach invited Luna to play in his crib and to sit next to him at his piano.  So cute!!

Abuelo's sister in law, Jennifer, and her daughter Elizabeth came through town for a visit.  Elizabeth had been in San Antonio doing an internship for her Hotel Mgmt major at the JW Marriott!  We were so excited to see them as it had been forever!  And Luna fell in love with them both.  They are definitely kid people, and especially Jennifer as she had worked for years in a Montessori school for toddlers.